Pumpkin Pie Smoothie

The weather lately has been playing with my emotions. It was so unbearably hot for what seemed like forever that I thought fall would never come. Don’t worry, I am mot wishing away summer! We had some cool days with rain which put me in the mood for scarves, boots, and anything pumpkin related. Food, drinks, the color, you name it, I like it. So, now its hot again. The a/c is on and the windows are shut (which is fine with me since my allergies are terrible this time of year), but I’m still craving fall. The apples, pumpkins, scarves, and boots. Well, this afternoon I couldn’t take it anymore! I had to make something pumpkin! And thank you Pinterest for helping me find that something. You see, I had a plain chocolate protein shake on the menu for this afternoon, but got hungry too early for it. So I decoded to hunt my Pinterest boards to find a shake or smoothie that would be more filling. And here it is folks! It’s tasty. Satisfying. And reeks of fall! (okay, maybe reek isn’t the right word, jut you get my drift)

Pumpkin Pie Smoothie

1/2 banana
1/3 cup pumpkin puree (no sugar added)
1/3 cup plain Greek yogurt (would be yummy with vanilla too)
3/4 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
1 packet stevia (or sweetener of choice)
A few shakes of pumpkin pie spice
4-5 ice cubes

Place all ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth.

Enjoy!

Fruit Smoothie

I’ve apparently been on a smoothie kick lately. I don’t know, its an easy way to get some extra fruit in for me. I’m not too great at eating the fruits and veggies. But I try. My sister, Jen,posted this one facebook for a cousin of ours and I decided to try it out this morning. Here are three reasons you should make this: 1) it’s yummy
2) its easy
3) because I said so. (just kidding…kind of)

Fruit Smoothie (from my beautiful sister, Jen)

1 cup strawberries (fresh or frozen)
1/2 cup pineapple (fresh or frozen, you could probly use canned as well)
1 banana
6-8 ice cubes
Sweetener of choice (I used one packet of Truvia, but you could also use sugar, honey or nothing, if you wanted)
1/2 cup coconut milk

Put all ingredients in blender and blend until desired consistantcy.

See, I told you it was easy.

Enjoy!

Smooth(ie) Operator

I have been really enjoying smoothies lately. Now that I’ve found an easy recipe that I always have the ingredients for, I have one of these almost every day. Seriously. I feel like a lot of smoothie’s I come across (mostly on Pinterest) have weird ingredients in them like kale or spinach, which, let’s be honest, still kinda freaks me out. That stuff is meant for salads. But, maybe one of these days I’ll give it a try and love it. For now, I’ll stick with what I know.

The other thing I really like about this smoothie is that it’s pretty versatile. You can add just about any fruit that blend well. I have been sticking to berry’s mostly, because, again, it’s what I know. (I don’t branch out much) The only ingredient that I found weird was the oatmeal. I’ve looked at other smoothie recipes with oatmeal in them and thought it was the weirdest thing and that it would give it an odd texture. But, I gave it a shot and it’s delish! You can’t even tell the oatmeal was in there. It just gives it a little more body. So don’t freak out when you read that it has oatmeal in it. It’s totally worth trying out before you judge it.

The original recipe used raspberries, which is truly delicious. I ran out of them very quickly, since I love raspberries so much, so I replaced with strawberries and blueberries. I have some blackberries right now and I will be trying that out soon too! Possibly today 🙂

Enjoy!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Simple Fruit Smoothie  (adapted from marthastewart.com)

Yield: 2 servings

1 cup ice

1/2 cup berries (I’ve used raspberries, strawberries, blueberries, blackberries and combinations of them as well)

1/2 cup plain greek yogurt

1 banana

1/2 cup  dry oatmeal

1 Tbsp honey

1 cup milk (I’ve been using almond milk or coconut milk. You could also use white milk)

Add ice and berries to the bottom of the blender, then add the other ingredients on top. Blend until smooth.

*Note: I generally only make half the recipe when I make it for breakfast. I freeze the other half of the banana to use the next day. I do suggest slicing the banana before freezing, because I think it blend better that way. I make mine in my Magic Bullet so I don’t have the blender to wash every day.